9 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
“I have nothing bad to say about this place. I just need to be somewhere else.” It is in writing now, which changes what Molodechno can pretend not to have heard.
The chances are being made and something is happening between the making and the finishing. 6 matches now, and the anxiety in the ground arrives a little earlier every week.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molodechno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad2 Jul 2029
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maxim Yablonskiy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Olav Øby was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
3 games without scoring. Strikers stop looking up, midfielders take the extra touch, and every shot that clears the bar is followed by a groan that has been building since the last goal.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Molodechno will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Arseniy Yushkevich did not need any: 8.34, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
Olav Øby was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
At 21 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
“The manager did not use many words, and he did not need to.” Evgeniy Elezarenko has his answer from Molodechno; what he does with it is the next window’s story.
Bones knit. That is the one merciful thing about this injury and the reason Molodechno will talk about it more openly than they would about a knee. He will be back, and roughly when they say.
The hardest thing about being 21 in a senior side is that nobody makes allowances. Arseniy Yushkevich did not need any: 7.79, and he looked the most comfortable man on the pitch.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molodechno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad19 Mar 2029
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maxim Yablonskiy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
There is a particular warmth a ground reserves for a 21-year-old it feels ownership of. Arseniy Yushkevich has it now, and everything he does for the rest of his time here will be measured against the goodwill he was handed for free.
Another week, another link, another denial nobody quite believes. Molodechno know the market decides these things, not the back pages — but the back pages are louder.
Olav Øby was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad18 Dec 2028
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Miroevskiy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
At 34 he is supposed to be managing his minutes. Instead he was marked 8.16 and looked, for ninety minutes, exactly like the player everybody remembers.
Headers, blocks, tackles, interceptions — 23 of them, and not one goal behind him. The sort of performance that never makes a highlight reel and wins football matches.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molodechno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad31 Jul 2028
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Maxim Yablonskiy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Slavia Mozyr are out and Molodechno go through, 2‑0 the final word. The bracket opens up a little, and everyone allows themselves a look at it.
Player ratings5 Jun 2028
Titus Bulus, 19, plays like he has been here for years — 8.03
A mark of 8.03 means one thing beside a twenty-nine-year-old's name and something else entirely beside a 19-year-old's. Nobody at the ground needed telling which this was.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molodechno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Orsha will keep picking him until June and will get nothing for him after it. Artem Volodkov has pre-agreed a move to Molodechno, and the only people who lose in that arrangement are the ones who let the contract run down.
The oldest argument in any dressing room and the only one that is genuinely about football: one man thinks another is not putting enough in. It is also the row a manager privately does not mind having happened.
At 22 he is being sung about by people twice his age, which is an affection a signing has to earn over years and a local kid gets for turning up. It is also the hardest thing in football to live up to.
8.34. There are performances a supporter describes to somebody who was not there and cannot quite convey; this was one, and the number does not help either.
The words a physio says slowly. 163 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
“This is not anger. I have thought about it for months, and nothing that has happened lately changed my mind.” The request is on a desk at Molodechno, and it is not being withdrawn.
“Things were said to me before I signed. I am not going to repeat them, but I remember all of them.” Molodechno have not answered, which is an answer of sorts.
4 without a win now, and the ground has developed the special quiet of a crowd that expects the worst. One scrappy 1-0 would cure most of it; that is the maddening part.
Olav Øby was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad29 May 2028
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Miroevskiy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
Some goals win a match and some take one off somebody else. Artur Sagitov scored in the 86th minute, Smorgon had already begun thinking about the journey home, and Molodechno took the lot.
Olav Øby was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Hard to beat is not the same as winning, but 6 matches without defeat is a foundation Molodechno did not have in the autumn.
Squad1 May 2028
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Yassine Bara is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
1 kept out in the shoot-out, and a stadium that will still be describing them in twenty years. A goalkeeper only needs one of these to be remembered forever.
It was not about football and everybody who saw it knows that. Two men who have to play together on Saturday said things at Molodechno this week that will take longer than a week to unsay.
Squad10 Apr 2028
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Alexandr Selyava is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.
The words a physio says slowly. 62 days is what the club will announce and everybody who has heard this diagnosis before knows the number is the least of it: the knee comes back before the player does.
There is a version of every career where the player ends up somewhere he chose rather than somewhere that chose him. Alexandr Mischenko is living that version at Molodechno, and it tends to show in the first month.
Olav Øby was at the centre of it, and by the time it was pulled apart there were three or four others involved. Training grounds are small places and long seasons make them smaller.
Squad20 Dec 2027
Words at Molodechno training over how hard people work
Somebody said out loud what several people had been thinking. Artem Miroevskiy is at the centre of it, and the squad will now find out whether the standard rises or the pair of them simply stop speaking.